Dan Mills offers 'Something Good'

“Sincere and bittersweet” are words that have been used to describe the music of Dan Mills, who wears classic country, folk and Americana sounds like a smooth, but leathery pair of broken-in boots.

Mills is known to theater audiences for his portrayal of country legend Carl Perkins in the show “Million Dollar Quartet,” with which Mills was during the last six months of the show’s Broadway run in New York and then for several stretches longer off-Broadway. His own music isn’t far off the twangy Sun Records sound Perkins was associated with, but he also has a foot firmly in the folk/Americana tradition, heavy on poignant lyrics, snapshots of the hopeful and the resigned and titles like “Best I Could,” “Lonely When You’re Gone,” “Quiet Car” and “Easier Said Than Done.”

Country stuff, in other words, and well expressed on “Something Good,” the album Mills released in July.

“There’s a lot of time and care that went into this, and it all came about from me getting roped into the greatest group of musicians in New York. I just happened to stumble into their life, and they to mine, and we write and record with a lot of intention,” explained Mills, who opens for Melissa Ferrick at Plymouth’s Spire Center for the Performing Arts on Saturday. “My main goal with ‘Something Good’ was to bring that intention to my own music and make it great lyrically and conceptually, but also make it accessible. We’re not pandering to a short attention span – we don’t want you bored and we want you to find substance in it.”

Originally from Cranston, R.I., Mills was based in New York for a decade before returning to the Boston area in 2015. He lives in Cambridge and has started to turn up more in the local clubs, including an upcoming date at Porter Square Haunt Toad on October 10.

Much of his extended family is still in the area, Mills said, but part of what brought him back north was a local job that, he’s also found, has been very supportive of his music career.

“What I find interesting is that as a musician today, you actually end up running a small business,” he said. “Something like 80 or 85 percent of your time is spent managing websites, merchandise, social media, all these things that aren’t actually the time you spend doing music. I’ve had a great opportunity with a small tech company – they let me tour, they come out to my shows, and it’s not a pity thing – they generally care about my well being.”

Mills began writing his own songs in high school and playing out during his college years. Music has always come first, he said, whereas theater was more of a happy accident.

“I got discovered by a talent scout playing a gig in New York, and that launched me into acting, which became auditions for music and commercials, too,” he said. “It was great, but it also made me nervous. I never got comfortable with it. What it taught me was that I got to become close with actors who sincerely love acting, and I wasn’t there for that. I wanted to go back to music, and not let the industry decide how my life was going to go.”

That said, Mills hasn’t closed the door on future theater performances, and regularly records with many of his New York theater friends, as well as writes and composes for theater and screen. Working in “Million Dollar Quartet” also exposed him to some of his musical heroes, interestingly enough, such as BR-549’s Chuck Mead, who was the show’s musical director.

“It’s funny, once you’re in that union, you’re in it,” Mills said. “I do get the calls, and probably once every six weeks someone will recommend an audition. ‘Million Dollar Quartet’ is a franchise show now; I get cruise ship offers, and when you’re cast on Broadway, casting agencies have you labeled in a database. The door isn’t closed. But my focus is Dan Mills the musician.”